With almost 100 vendors signed up at time of writing, Passion will offer three days of kinky shopping and workshops, from Friday November 17 to Sunday 19, with a fetish/play party night on Saturday 18.

Location for the whole event, including the party, is the MesseHalle Hamburg-Schnelsen, on the north-west outskirts of the city.

Pervs with longer memories may recognise this venue as the location of the German Fetish Fair for the two years (2010 and ’11) when the German Fetish Ball Weekend decamped from Berlin to Hamburg.

A big plus, when compared with the kind of venues the majority of fetish fairs and expos are obliged to make do with, is that Hamburg-Schnelsen is a proper modern exhibition centre — spacious, brightly lit and offering full professional facilities.

The downside, for anyone without a car who wants to experience the famous delights of Hamburg, is that it is a pricey cab ride (or long bus ride) from the city centre.

The experience of the GFB’s Hamburg years was that the distance from the city centre to the MesseHalle was something of a deterrent to visitors.

But it must be remembered that all the other events of the GFB’s Hamburg weekends were held in more central parts of the city. So the Fair was the one event that for many visitors involved extra effort and expense.

Passion, however, is all in one place, so its location on the outskirts may not be such an issue. It’s also good to know that there are local hotels serving the venue (a couple — Hotel Ausspann and Racket Inn — are recommended on the Passion website).

So for those coming from out of town to visit for more than a day, or to work at this event, it is perfectly possible to avoid long/expensive commutes if you don’t mind staying outside the centre.

Organised by M+A Messemanagement, an exhibition firm run by Michael von Enzberg and his partner Anne, Passion could be seen as northern Germany’s answer to BoundCon, the bondage fest that takes place each spring in Munich.

For BoundCon also attracts a large number of exhibitors compared with the GFF or Fetish Evolution — mainly from the BDSM scene but also including a number of fetish clothing and accessories brands. And it also includes a party.

But there the similarities seem to end. The first Passion takes place in the peak shopping season before Christmas, one week before Black Friday. This should maximise its appeal as a dedicated seasonal gift fair for the kink community.

Organiser M+A has also managed to pick dates that do not ‘inadvertently’ clash with any other big German fetish weekend — although Passion is taking place just one week after Germany’s other big fetish debut of 2017, Avantgardista in Munich.

At publication time, some 97 exhibitors had booked stands for the first Passion fair.

Of these, more than 80 are German companies, ranging from the smallest hobby-type businesses to internationally known brands.

Most of these are offering BDSM-related products — no surprise to anyone who has ever been to any German fetish fair and noticed how prevalent BDSM manufacturers are among the exhibitors.

That said, Germany’s fetish clothing scene is also substantial, and quite well represented at Passion’s debut. More than a dozen clothing brands familiar from other fetish fairs are taking stands in Hamburg.

Among the domestic clothing brands you’ll find there — mostly but not all latex specialists — are Amatoris, Chronomatic, Couture Latex, Feitico, Fernando Berlin, Latex Line, LLdeSaxe Fashion, Luxury Noire, Pony Couture, TO.mTO Berlin, Tourniquet and Très Bonjour.

In fact, the only non-domestic latex designer participating in Passion’s debut is also its only British exhibitor: Amentium.